Evie on a Friday Night
by patsycline
Summary: This is my first fan fic...a one shot about Evie and Steve. Mostly about Evie...I've wanted to write about a greaser girl as a real human being for a while, so here goes.


Evie on a Friday Night

Evie was sitting on her porch, waiting for her boyfriend Steve Randle to show up. It was May in Tulsa, and it was hot, and she was sure she was already sweating. But Steve Randle had been Evie's boyfriend for a good long while now, and Evie found herself caring less and less about how good she looked for him.

Evie lit a cigarette, and she crossed and uncrossed her legs, trying to get comfortable. Steve had called a few minutes before to tell her he was on his way. He'd sounded mad about something, which wasn't unusual for Steve. Oh, he rarely got mad at her. Something about Evie calmed Steve down, she'd realized…the way she could get him to relax by putting her hand on his chest, whispering, "Now, silly baby, it'll be all right." The way she could make him laugh by pushing out her bottom lip in a fake pout when he got upset. Sometimes she felt like his mother, protecting him from everything that made him seem to hate the world he lived in. Evie was sure Steve only loved her, his gang, and maybe the cars he worked on at the DX.

Soon she heard the crunch of tires over gravel, and sure enough there was Steve pulling up in his Ford. She stood up to get in the car, stopping to lock the door to the house behind her. There was no one home.

Steve leaned over and pushed the door of the Ford open, so she could get in. The days of Steve coming up to the porch to pick her up were long gone, but Evie didn't exactly mind. She'd been happy when the relationship had progressed to just feeling comfortable with each other, without having to act like teenagers on a date in some stupid movie.

"What's wrong?" Evie asked immediately, sliding in next to Steve, who was smoking a cigarette and drumming his fingers anxiously on the steering wheel.

Steve put the car in gear and they were pulling out onto Evie's street. She could tell it was something serious.

"The Socs beat up Johnny this afternoon. Soda and I found him on our way home from work today, in the vacant lot near Soda's house." He was spitting out the words.

"Was it very bad?" Evie asked, twisting toward Steve to look at him. She knew the answer already by the way he was acting.

"Yeah, it was bad," Steve said, nodding. "Maybe the worst I've ever seen." Evie knew then that it had to be awful, because her boyfriend Steve Randle had seen a lot of bad things.

"They jumped him alone? All by himself? Those assholes don't give anyone a fighting chance," Evie said angrily, turning back to her window to peer out at their neighborhood slipping by them. She still didn't know where they were going, but her mind was busy picturing Johnny all beat up and bruised and alone in the vacant lot until Steve and Soda found him. Of all the kids in the world to beat up, they had to pick Johnny, who was cute but so little and shy. He had dark skin and dark hair, and once, at a party, a drunk Evie had called Johnny her little cup of coffee. Johnny had turned red and smiled, which had surprised Evie. She didn't know he had it in him.

"One of the guys was wearing rings, and they cut him up real bad," Steve said, accelerating. "Fuckin' animals."

Evie said nothing for a while. She knew it was useless to even try to calm Steve down at this point. Anyway, she was angry, too. Finally, she asked Steve where they were headed.

"Evie," Steve announced without looking at her, "I feel like getting drunk."

Evie lit up a new cigarette and stared forward with him.

"All right," she said, quietly. "Then let's."

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Steve had bought plenty of beer at a convenience store, and the two of them had parked Steve's Ford in the corner of one of the parks on the East Side. It was empty and quiet, which surprised and pleased Evie. She thought maybe kids would be taking advantage of the warm night. Then again, it was bordering on 10 o'clock.

The two of them were seated on the hood of the car, drinking and smoking and not talking much at all. Steve was drinking faster than Evie, but she was already starting to feel the pleasant warmth in her face and fingers that came with getting just the right amount of drunk.

Steve lay down on the hood of the car, resting his bottle of beer on his stomach. Evie turned to look at him. He looked so handsome at that moment that Evie felt that same surge of luck and excitement that she'd felt when they were first together, just dumb 14-year-olds without any idea what they were doing.

"Steve, let's go visit Johnny tomorrow," Evie said, taking a swallow. "I want to say hi."

"Okay," Steve said. "He's at Soda's house tonight, and it's likely he'll be there tomorrow, as bad as he is."

Evie nodded. Johnny didn't like to go home. Sometimes, neither did Steve.

"I'm so glad school is almost over and summer's here," Steve said. "One more year and then we're done for good. Then I can get a job full-time at the DX and bring in real money."

Evie nodded in agreement. There had been a time when Steve had considered dropping out along with his friend Soda to work at the gas station full time, but Evie would have none of it. She didn't want him to drop out, she'd told Steve evenly. When Steve had argued that a full-time mechanic didn't need a high school diploma, Evie had made up some lie about the fact that she didn't want to finish school without him, and Steve had relented, and he hadn't dropped out. But Evie knew that there was something about being with a drop out that would have burned her up inside. Why, she didn't know. She didn't necessarily think Soda was a bad person for dropping out, but she wouldn't have wanted to date him, not even as handsome as he was.

Evie had mixed feelings about school. As a ninth grader, she'd been surprised when she'd been put in A-level classes, the classes for the smart kids. She'd found out later the decision had been made based on the results of an aptitude test everyone had taken at the end of junior high. And Evie, apparently, had done quite well on it.

But in the A-level classes, Evie had felt completely out of place. The rooms were full of Socs and middle class kids, with their neat, clean clothes and expensive school supplies. Evie had tried her best to look all right for school, but she couldn't compete with the way the Socy girls looked, with their seemingly brand new outfits every day. Evie had found herself sitting in the back, staring at all their cleanness and niceness, and wanting to curl up a little in embarrassment. She wanted to know how the Socs did the things they did, how they managed to look so cool and put together all the time, as if the world was made just for them, which it probably was. She wondered if the Soc girls wanted to know how Evie did the things she did. How she was able to eyeline her eyes until they looked like two fresh bruises. Or how she could rat her dark black hair until it was several inches above her head. Evie laughed at the thought of any Soc girl taking any interest in those things.

At first, Evie had tried. She really had. But she was behind the other kids, and she struggled to keep up, especially in math. Her English teacher had been an all right lady who really seemed to love teaching, and on one test – one where Evie had scored a C – the teacher had scrawled, "You're smarter than this" in red pen.

But was she? Evie wasn't so sure.

The teachers had told her she had to study more, stay after school for extra help. The ability was there, but she had to want it. Didn't Evie want it?

"Evie, with your brain, you could earn scholarships for college," her History teacher had told her one afternoon after class. "But you've got to earn the grades first."

But to Evie, going to college sounded like going to the moon or to Europe. People who went to college lived on the West Side, in houses with nice wallpaper and wall-to-wall carpeting instead of hardwood floors. Of course, Evie had never been inside a house on the West Side, but she guessed as much from looking through pictures in magazines and watching television.

Soon, Evie had found herself doodling in the borders of her notebook, staring out open windows, counting the minutes for the bell to ring. Then she'd stopped trying all together.

It didn't help that midway through her first year, she'd started talking to Steve at a party in the neighborhood and before she knew it, he was her first real boyfriend. She'd known him her whole life, but that night, there had been something different. His dark, greased hair and dangerous eyes had held a special kind of appeal. That night, he'd gotten into a fight with another boy in the front yard of the house, and he'd won, and Evie remembered how exciting it had been to sit on the porch, clutching a beer, watching the action and knowing that the boy she liked was winning.

They'd started spending time together, and pretty soon Evie was cutting class to meet up with him and his friends, and some of her old girlfriends from the neighborhood like Sandy and Sylvia. By the end of the year, Evie had managed to pass the ninth grade with a D average, but her guidance counselor had told her she couldn't stay in A-level classes anymore.

"It's too bad, Evie," her counselor, a thin little woman with a tiny bald spot at the back of her head, had said, crinkling her nose. "You could have really made something of yourself if you had tried." Evie had sensed something of a smirk cross the woman's face as she'd said it, but maybe Evie was just imagining things.

And after the woman had told her that she couldn't be in A-level classes anymore, Evie had rolled her eyes and told her to forget it, to put her in the regular classes and be done with it. That's where her friends and her boyfriend were, anyway. And then she'd stomped out of the office with all the certainty of a tough, 14-year-old girl.

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Steve was throwing the empty beer bottles against some nearby trees, enjoying the hard, smashing sound they made as they shattered.

"Steve, the fuzz will show," Evie mumbled. She felt she had crossed that line into being too drunk, where things started to swoon around her. She was still sitting on the hood of the car, afraid to get down.

"Nah, they won't show up around here," Steve answered, picking up another bottle to toss. "Maybe some Socs will, and I get to kick some ass to make me feel better."

"I thought I made you feel better," Evie said in a half mad way, kicking the front of the car with her heel.

"You do," Steve said, reaching out to touch her left shoulder. "And don't kick the car."

This annoyed Evie, who was growing bored from sitting on the hood of a Ford drinking beers all night. She wished for a party or for Soda and Sandy to show up, or for something to just happen. Hell, even the Socs showing up would be a cause for action.

"Why do you like cars so much?" Evie asked, fumbling around for her pack of cigarettes.

Steve paused for a moment, genuinely enjoying the question. "I guess I like figuring them out. It's something I know I can figure out." He grinned and then laughed to himself. "I'm gonna be the best mechanic in town. I'm going to fix anything on wheels. I already can and I'm only 17."

Evie lit the smoke. "Maybe you can open your own shop after we graduate," said Evie. "That would be pretty tuff."

"Yeah, maybe," Steve had answered. "The people at the DX, though, they treat me pretty good. You know that."

Steve was smart, Evie knew. Not book smart, but smart in a different way that helped him figure out how cars worked. But Evie didn't think Steve was particularly ambitious.

"What am I going to be?" Evie asked.

"I thought you were gonna do hair," Steve answered, opening another beer.

That was probably true. Just recently, all the juniors had had to meet with their counselors to decide what track of classes to continue onto in the 12th grade. Evie had had to meet with the same pinched face lady who'd kicked her out of the A-level classes years before. Looking at her, Evie now felt even more anger.

The truth was, Evie had been bored in the regular classes. She passed them without trying, and she thought the teachers were almost insulting. She could do her assignments in front of the television, when there were even any assignments at all, and in class, she could sleep in the back row and the teacher wouldn't get mad.

"Well, we're just counting the minutes now," her English teacher would always say at the end of class, and he'd usually give the students 20 minutes to just talk to each other until the bell rang, even though the class was only 45 minutes long. She felt like school was making her dumber.

When Evie had met with the counselor the week before to discuss her senior year, she'd mentioned, just to see what the counselor would say, being put back in the A-level classes for her senior year.

"What's wrong with the classes you're in now?" the counselor had asked, not looking at Evie but instead at some papers on her desk.

"They're boring," Evie had answered. "I'm bored in them."

The counselor looked up now and stared at Evie directly, then straightened the stack of papers into a neat little pile.

"You have an A average now, Evie. You were barely passing the A-levels your freshman year. I think it's clear where you belong."

Evie had crossed her arms in front of herself and bitten her bottom lip. The woman was going to make her beg.

"I'd like to try them again, if I could," she had said, pushing herself to be polite.

The counselor had nodded her head and tried to look like she felt sorry for Evie, but Evie knew she didn't. Then the woman had pulled out a piece of paper from the neat stack and pushed it across the desk toward Evie.

"This is information on our cosmetology program," she'd said. "I think this would be a good fit for you."

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Evie felt very drunk now, and suddenly, she felt like crying. Thinking back to what the counselor had said made her remember, for some strange reason, the way her mother had reacted when she'd told her she'd been kicked out of A-levels her first year of high school.

"Well, Evie, you are what you are," she had said.

Her face felt hot. The metal of the Ford was hurting her rear end. The sound of the crashing bottles was making her tense up. Then she heard Steve's voice.

"Hey, Evie, are you crying?" he asked.

Evie pressed her fingers up to her face and smeared the tears away. Her fingertips came back black. She realized she was sobbing in earnest.

"Steve," Evie gulped, not caring how she looked, "Steve, are you going to marry me?"

Steve was taken aback for a moment, then reached his hands out to touch Evie's face.

"Yeah, Evie," he said tenderly, gently. "Of course I'm going to marry you. Of course I am."

"You are?" Evie had asked, choking back more tears and trying to calm down. "You swear to God you will?"

Steve had nodded, his eyes clearly confused.

"Why are you crying?" he asked, cupping her face in his hands and rubbing away the tears with his thumbs. Only he was drunk, and he was pressing too hard.

Evie grabbed his wrists with her hands and pulled them down into her lap. He was standing right in front of her, she was still sitting on the car.

"I don't know why I'm crying," Evie said. "I don't know. Maybe I just feel bad about Johnny."

Steve nodded in an understanding way. Steve was a good boy, really. He was going to work at the DX and she was going to do hair and they were going to get married and have babies, and everything was going to be just fine. Steve was a good boy.

"Evie, let's get in the car," Steve said quietly, holding her hands in his. "Come on, Evie, hey?"

Evie looked at him. He was very soused, and so was she. Getting in the car – in the back seat, specifically – was nothing new to Evie. After all, she and Steve had been going together for almost three years. Like all things, it had lost some of its magic.

But Evie said, "All right, Steve."

They slid off the hood of the Ford, Evie heading behind the passenger side, Steve behind the driver's seat. As Evie stepped in, she kept the back door open.

"Let's have one more cigarette," she said, pulling a fresh one out of her pack. A little groan of disappointment slipped out of the back of Steve's throat, and he let his head flop back as he closed his eyes, but he didn't say anything.

Evie lit the cigarette and let the gray smoke curl outside, slipping into the starry night around her. She puffed away quietly, not exactly sure why she was delaying the inevitable. Off in the distance, there was the sound of cars rumbling down the main road nearby. A minute or so passed. The tears on her face were starting to dry.

Then, expertly, she flicked the cigarette outside and slammed the door. Hearing this, Steve opened his right eye and peered at her, grinning. Evie gave him a half smile back and slipped down onto the seat below her.

Steve is a good boy, she thought to herself. He's a good boy, and he's going to marry me.

She heard the squeak and the squeeze of the seat underneath them as Steve pushed himself on top of Evie, who licked her lips and tried to get comfortable under his weight. As her right arm encircled Steve, she pressed her left hand up, up against the cool, hard glass of the car window. Steve was kissing her neck and heading towards her lips.

"Evie, oh Evie," whispered Steve, and she opened up her mouth and gave in.


End file.
